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Patterson Drive

Comments

I had a Patterson Drive that I recently sold. I never got around to installing it. Had several email exchanges with Sam Patterson about installation, and one was concerning the shifter. I checked and I still had the email, so pasted Sam's reply below. Hope it helps.

On the shifter selection, the best choice is a simple indexing shifter designed for a front derailleur. Two or three CR doesn’t matter. For a three click simple indexing shifter, you should not be able to get to the third click due to the positive cable stop in the Patterson Transmission.

Friction can work, but is not as good as simple indexing because we want to either pull cable suddenly or release it all the way suddenly. Friction creates the possibility that the cable will be released 90 % but not 100% which could cause the Control Pawl to be only partially locked into the Ratchet Wheel / Sun Gear. This could be unstable in high gear resulting in occasional “skipping” which is annoying and can lead to damage of the Control Pawl or Ratchet Wheel. (These parts are easily removed and replaced in any event.)

The Patterson Transmission should work well with ANY simple indexing shifter designed for a front derailleur. (Rear derailleur shifters have clicks too close together. They can still work, but its not as nice as a simple indexing shifter with no additional “fine tune detents”.

Shifters that are designed to work with front derailleurs sometimes have additional “fine tune detents”. These can cause confusion and problems, but I haven’t found one that just wouldn’t work at all. Just annoying.

The points to remember when setting up a shifter are:

1. When adjusted, the shifter should pull cable enough (9 mm) such that the Control Pawl is safely out of the way of the Ratchet Wheel for low gear. When you pull cable sufficiently, you should not hear any clatter from the Control Pawl ticking against the Ratchet Wheel. If you hear a bit of clatter, just tighten the cable a bit.

2. The shifter should also release the cable all the way so that the Bell Crank (which the cable is clamped to) reaches all the way to the limit screw in its arcuate limit slot. That way you can be sure that the Control Pawl is fully released and can lock into place against the Ratchet Wheel.

If you have a Grip Shift set, it should work. Especially if it is a simple two or three click or “simple indexing”. If it is one with lots of little clicks (“pseudo friction”) then It could still work, but you would have to pull two or three clicks, then remember to release two or three clicks all the way. Like I said, if that is the case, I would be happy to optimize it for use with the Patterson Transmission by lopping off the unneeded clicks with a Dremel tool.